No Wonder People are Shallow and Hate Themselves.

I was at the doctors office this morning and stumbled across an article in a trash magazine titled, Stars Without Makeup. I was flipping through the rag waiting the typical,1 hour plus to see the doctor. For some reason this article has me borderline enraged. I came home and tracked down screen shots to illustrate.





The pictures come complete with captions about how the women would look better with a bit of mascara/lipstick. How sad is this culture? Sure, these women are celebrities, blah, blah, blah; people will say how much they hate Kim Kardashian anyways, but they're still people with feelings.

Not only that. Say you go to the doctors office, you've been feeling depressed. Maybe you're a new mother and you don't have a lot of time to primp. You read trash like this, and you're likely to feel even more crappy than before.

Especially middle aged women. The article shows pictures of women 30+ who look "horrid" without makeup, and then there is a blurb box showing women under 30 who look "pretty" without make up. No wonder so many women are terrified of aging.

The expectations!

F&$@ publications like this, and the media culture in general.

And, this isn't the patriarchy ladies. Women are by and far the buyers of trash like this. Why do this to yourself? If you're super confident and this type of crap would never affect you...it's still pretty sh&$ reading material.

Fellow women, I hope you know you're fine wether you have a pound of make up on, or you hate wearing make up. Live for yourself, because otherwise you can never win.

I'm not a woman!

a reply to: Atsbhct

Well...I'm certainly not dating any of THOSE women anymore.

I've been trying to tell the females in my life this: Our corporations profit from their low self esteem. Cosmetics & beauty supply companies, dieting companies, clothing lines, cosmetic surgeons, and a lot more need women to have low self worth in order to maintain their quarterly profits.

The business model is to take a female, alter her appearance until she looks like a completely different person (fake hair, makeup, cosmetic surgery, push up bras, etc), and then parade the altered version as the new beauty standard. Then they alter the altered female even more through camera angles, lighting, and photo editing. Then they give the final result glamorous titles like "World's Most Beautiful Woman", "Most Desirable Woman", "Miss Universe", etc. They even make sure to show off the love lives of these altered women to provoke more jealousy & insecurity.

After seeing these altered ones and the status & acknowledgement they receive, the real females now feel inadequate. After all, even the celebs and models are "ugly" without all of these alterations. So of course, they turn to the companies I mentioned before in order to try "improve" their own appearances and feelings of self worth. And of course, the altered women endorse products & services that can miraculously help real women look like them. I guess you can say those companies craft the "ideal" image then profit from each woman's attempts to gain it.

a reply to: enlightenedservant

Yes! Thank you for such a well written reply.

a reply to: Atsbhct
There was a short spell in the Sixties when the "no make-up look" became fashionable.
The immediate response of the manufacturers was to produce make-up specially designed to provide that look.

a reply to: Atsbhct

As a shallow man, they do look rough without makeup

But it's not like we don't get treated the same with being expected to be built like Spartan Warriors

a reply to: Atsbhct

No problem. Though honestly, I wish this stuff never existed. Don't get me wrong, it's none of my business if women choose to wear or buy this stuff. If they like it then that's all fine & dandy.

The part I hate is when women feel like they have to do this stuff just to be accepted in society. And even worse, when people look down on women for not doing some of this stuff. A lot of women feel like they can't even go out in public without wearing their makeup & whatever other morning rituals they do. That just feels wrong to me because they should be accepted as they are.

a reply to: DISRAELI

That's sort of an oxymoron isn't it?
How did they manage that?

I think some of the ladies in the article are quite lovely without their make up. It's all a matter of personal taste, isn't it?
Kendra could be in a burlap sack and bald and still be a cutie pie...IMO.

It's a shame that society puts so much pressure on people to be a certain way physically to feel accepted.

Would you date a woman who doesn't shave her legs and/or pits?

We'd all like to think we're above Madison Ave. prescriptions of beauty, but...



I think we're all more affected by them than we care to admit.

a reply to: NthOther

Any man in a long term relationship occasionally dates a woman with unshaved body hair, honestly.

Fellow women, I hope you know you're fine wether you have a pound of make up on, or you hate wearing make up. Live for yourself, because otherwise you can never win.

A woman's dress and sheen are her prerogatives entirely. Less is more.
This and other excuses for hating the self stem from decisions in conflict with instinct, such as being what you call shallow, which usually implies caring little about phrasing false testimony about most anything.

a reply to: NthOther

Would I or have I? LOL I think you're asking the wrong question.

a reply to: Atsbhct

Maybe you can get to a long-term relationship without dating first, but I don't know how.

I don't understand it. Being male I have to say I find it much more attractive if a girl/woman does not wear makeup or at least if it isnt noticeable to me. It is sad what matters to people..

a reply to: NthOther

I did that once. Though admittedly we did hang out for a couple months prior as friends and with other friends and at some point started to walk arm in arm and eventually I just said "I love you" as we sat in the cold on the steps in front of the church doors one morning. We had thought of living together in a distant future earlier. It was rather backwards.

a reply to: Tiamat384

Agreed.

You see naturally beautiful women so easily manipulated into completely changing their appearance.

That's more unattractive than any body hair or poor complexion to me.

Sadly for a sizeable percentage of men all they want out of a partner is good looks.

Men are still expected to be hard-working, ambitious, emphatic, strong-willed, and happy to do the dirty work all at once.

What's scary is that little girls are also effected by what they see and hear. Last year I discovered that someone's 6 year old would hardly eat because she didn't want to get fat and ugly. The kid was skinny as a rail!

Makeup sex is still the best.

originally posted by: TNMockingbird
That's sort of an oxymoron isn't it?
How did they manage that?

I've no idea. Not being a user of make-up myself, I just read the news item.